


It's a Miracle

by phoenixreal



Series: Divine Intervention [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-30
Updated: 2019-09-30
Packaged: 2020-11-07 23:10:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20825366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phoenixreal/pseuds/phoenixreal
Summary: Tony's sacrifice is met with divine favor.





	It's a Miracle

**Author's Note:**

> Gwerinos and I come together to create this short alternative ending to Endgame!

As all the avengers knelt in honour of Tony Stark, a bright light appeared overhead illuminating the battle ground and from it descended an angel, or at least a man with wings. He stood on top of the rubble that was once the Avengers headquarters and looked down at the scene. 

“I am the Archangel Michael. I have come for Anthony Edward Stark.” Each person heard his voice in their heads in their own first language. 

Steve looked up, heart beating in his ears, and saw this as something amazing. His own faith said such a thing was possible, but to actually have an angel come to the earth. However, he could think of no one more deserving than Tony Stark at that moment. Tony had made the sacrifice play after all, and every moment they had spent together and apart sped through his brain. 

Michael stepped off the the wall and with a flap of his wings he landed beside Tony’s body. He reached down to take it, but was body slammed by Thor. “You cannot have him. He must be honoured and sent on his way to Valhalla.”

Michael literally threw Thor off. “You are not God here,” he said angrily. 

Steve didn’t know what to do. He stood up and walked forward to grab Thor. “Please, Thor. Let’s see this through. We don’t know what’s happening.” 

Around them, various Avengers were standing and staring at the scene before them. None knew what to say, and instead, everyone waited to see what would happen. An archangel? Now, of all times? 

Steve had to wonder if this was real, or if this was some battlefield hallucination shared among them. But no, it felt as real as his hands on Thor’s arm. 

“You say you want to take Tony’s body?” Steve said. Pepper still knelt beside Tony. 

“That is what I have been ordered to do. If God wills it he will be healed and returned to you,” Michael said. “If Tony choses to return.”

Steve’s hand clenched Thor’s arm. “He could return.” 

“Please don’t say such things if they aren’t true,” Pepper whispered, her heart broken beyond belief without Tony alive.

There was a flash of lightning.    
  
Everyone looked at Thor. “It wasn’t me.” 

“You have all been honoured,” Michael said. “You may all come, so you may see God’s will in action.” 

Everyone had begun standing and coming closer to the scene. God’s will? Could this be real? Steve nodded. “If there is a possibility that Tony can be returned to us, I will go.” 

“I’ll go,” Dr Strange said. 

“Um...I think I’ll wait...No...come to think of it, I’ve got a beef to pick with him,” Bruce muttered. 

“I can answer your question, Dr Banner. God did not do that to you. You did it to yourself. You have free will. You experimented on yourself,” Michael told him. 

Pepper wiped tears from her eyes and nodded. “I’ll come. I have to see this for myself.”

Michael picked up Tony as if he was as light as a child, even though he was still in his Iron Man suit. He extended his wings and lifted off. In a moment the other started to float into the air as if caught in a strong updraft. But as soon as they blinked they were no longer floating but standing in what looked like the foyer of a very modern building with minimalist decor. To the others who had stayed behind, it seemed like they had simply vanished in the blink of an eye. 

“Welcome to heaven,” Michael said. He seemed far more relaxed now. He laid Tony down on a slab of something that just floated in the air and it moved of its own accord towards a wall which opened to allow access. “You may wait here.” 

Steve couldn’t believe what was happening, but to think there was a way to save Tony? He wasn’t sure he believed his own eyes, but looking around at the others, they, too, looked amazed and a tad overwhelmed at everything. He didn’t know what to say, so he ended up not saying anything.

Suddenly a man appeared with a trolley of drinks and food. At the same time a few rather comfortable looking couches also just appeared out of nowhere. “Looks like all of you could do with a few repairs,” he said in a very deep posh English accent. 

Another man appeared carrying an old fashioned doctor’s bag. “Who first?” Also in an English accent but no where near post or as deep as the other man. 

Steve looked around and when no one moved immediately, he nodded to Pepper. She nodded back and stepped forward to the man with the doctor’s bag. 

He pulled out a small device and scanned her. “Please remove the metal suit,” the doctor said. 

“Are you angels too?” Peter Parker asked. 

“No, child. I’m God,” the man with the posh accent said. 

Pepper froze for a moment, not sure what to think. She then removed the suit slowly, watching him as she did so. God? Tony was going to be so beside himself when he realized there was a god. 

“So Mr God, you’re English?” Peter continued. 

“No, I am...everything. Tony is very damaged. It isn’t possible to repair him so I am having him cloned and all his memories will be transferred to the clone. I thought you would like to know that, Dr Strange. And no, I will not repair your hands. You are responsible for that. You knew the dangers and you chose to ignore them. Appreciate the fact that no one else was harmed by your negligence.”

Steven was a bit taken aback by being told off by God. “One might say that about Tony.” 

“I’m not saving Tony for the reasons you think,” God replied. 

Steve, who had been quiet, spoke up then. “What are those reasons? He chose to make the sacrifice knowing it would kill him. Why bring him back?” 

“I would not dishonour his sacrifice by bringing him back because of his action with Thanos. As he has said so himself, he is really the only source of clean energy on the planet. The consequences of his death would destroy the planet. He must live.” 

Steve nodded. There were things that only Tony could do. He had a singular intellect and there was no one else like him. To think, God took into account such things as the fate of the earth into account when looking at what humans did.

“So, in a way, he’s saving the world twice,” Pepper said softly. 

“He has saved the world more than twice,” God replied. 

“Why didn’t you just save us all, you know bring us all back five years ago?” Peter asked. 

“What would you learn by that?” 

No one said anything for a moment as the thought that God saw them as children learning along the way began to sink in. 

“So, you just stood by and watched as half the universe was obliterated, as a lesson?” Bruce said, frowning at him.

“Everyone is back. You’ve discovered time travel. Now you must learn to use it wisely,” God replied. 

“Except Nat,” Clint said. 

“If it had been you instead of Natalie, your children would be fatherless and she would feel the guilt for the rest of her life. To bring her back would mean that Thanos would still be alive and half the population of the universe would be gone. What would you have me do?” 

There was an uncomfortable silence as everyone avoided Clint’s eyes for the moment. Nat’s sacrifice, too, had made everything possible. It wasn’t apparently a rule even God could break to bring her back to life. 

Steve still wondered at the situation, but he looked to God. “So, are you the creator of the whole universe?” he asked.

“In a way, yes. But perhaps not as any of you have yet to understand. I am the source. But you have free will. You create your own world out of what is available, what you have learnt.” 

“Give them the milkshake version,” the doctor suggested as he moved on through his patients.

“Free will is like choosing what flavour milkshake you want and then discovering you are sensitive to milk. You can have another milk shake if you choose but you must suffer the consequences,” God told them. 

Steve nodded, guessing that made sense. “What makes you take action now to help us?” he asked.

“You are facing extinction. Giving Tony back to your world will tip the scales.”

Pepper was watching God. “I know you aren’t doing this for me, but thank you anyway,” she said to him. 

“Why can’t I see your face?” Steven asked.

“Because I have borrowed your visage to appear to you.”

Steve waited patiently to see what happened. He glanced over to Thor, who looked rather unsure about this whole situation, but then, Steve couldn’t blame him. His whole world view had changed again with the inclusion of God in it’s mythos. 

God smiled. “You are still a god, Thor, just not THE god. You’ve always known that there was a single creator, everyone just calls me different things. Atheists call me the big bang. They don’t know how close to the truth they are.”

Thor made a thoughtful face and nodded. “There’s the idea of the creator in our books,” he said, recalling some of the histories he’d learned about the origins of their people. 

“There are two things I want to talk to you about, Steve. Firstly, your faith. Try to remember that the Bible was written over many centuries by old men with poor memories and dismal writing skills. Secondly, this plan of yours...of course you are free to implement it but consider the consequences. You live in a time where you can follow your heart. Consider what is right in front of you. Consider who loves you and who would follow you til the end of the line.”

Steve stared at him for a minute, unsure what to say to that. He knew the answer to that question, but the implication was something he had to think about. He simply nodded. “I see,” he said. No one knew of his plans, so for God to know them, he must truly have been all powerful as he imagined. 

The doctor got to Steve and scanned him. “You’re already healing,” he commented. 

“Oh, yeah,” Steve said. “I have accelerated healing ability,” he commented. 

“Take a drop of his blood. I’ll give it to Tony so he has a better chance of survival,” God told the doctor. 

Steve watched as the doctor took a sample of his blood. Anything to help Tony, he would do. So, it wasn’t a sure process, whatever he was doing. He was still trying to get his head around everything that he’d just been told. Like Thor, and everyone else, he’d been shown something that was beyond what he’d thought of. After all the aliens, strange powers, and more, he had little trouble now believing that God could be a force in the universe.

“What you’re doing for Tony, have you ever done it before?” Thor asked.

“No,” he replied honestly. “Doctor, attend to Steven. He is hiding his injuries with his abilities, but he has no accelerated healing ability or super power to protect him.”

The doctor pointed at Steve with a questioning face, so God pointed at Dr Strange.

“So no miracles?” Strange asked. 

“Miracles are just science you do not yet understand.” 

“Sounds like magic,” Peter said, looking at Strange. “The technology and abilities we don’t understand are like magic to us.” 

“Why don’t you just teach us the answers?” Strange asked. 

“Because handing a smart phone to a neanderthal is useless.” 

Peter smiled over at Dr. Strange. “We’ve gotta learn on our own,” he said. Dr. Strange didn’t seem terribly impressed by the information, but he allowed the doctor to see to his injuries.

“If you are still around in a hundred years, humans might graduate from grade 6,” God told them. 

“Grade 6?” Strange asked. 

“Post computer era,” God replied. 

“What comes after Grade 5?” Peter asked. 

“You might be around to find out,” he laughed in reply. 

Peter particularly liked God already. He was enjoying this meeting. Strange was still looking a bit grumpy to Peter’s eyes but he supposed he could understand that.

“I hope so!” Peter said with a nod. “Especially with Mr. Stark able to help!”

“Go live with your father. Let Aunt May get on with her own life.” 

Peter looked at him, not sure what to make of that statement. He frowned a bit and nodded. His aunt did need to have a life of her own, he supposed.

“But Peter is an orphan,” Steve said. 

“I think he suspects who his father is,” God countered. 

“I know enough,” Peter said and smiled at Steve. “At least, I know some things that I’ve picked up and I think I should confirm them.”

God nodded. He turned as Michael come through the wall carrying a vial that contained a liquid and a milky substance floating in it. 

“That’s Tony’s DNA,” Bruce said. 

“That’s so cool!” Peter said as he looked at it. “Everything Mr. Stark is, that’s in there.” 

“Such a small receptacle for everything a person is made up of,” Steve said, watching intently.

“Doctor, the blood.” The doctor put one drop of Steve’s blood into the vial. “So, he won’t exactly be the Tony you knew, more like the son of Tony and Steve but with all of Tony’s memories.” He turned to Pepper, give him time. He is still your husband and your daughter’s father. He’ll just be a little more protected than he was before.” 

Michael turned to walk away. “And Michael…”

“Yes, father?” 

“Give Peter a DNA swab from Tony.”

“Yes, father.”

Peter looked at God and nodded. He would find out for certain, now. 

Steve wondered how different Tony would be. What would he do about everything that had happened between them? And would he remember dying? That question more than anything niggled at his mind.

\----------------------  
  
Tony took a deep breath and opened his eyes. All the pain was gone as had all his injuries. He was lying in the rubble of the Avenger’s headquarters. The Avengers and their associatives were gathered around him all down on one knee. Most of them no longer had any injuries. 

‘Til the end of the line’ kept crossing Steve’s mind. 

Peter looked down at his hand and found he was holding a vial that said Tony’s DNA. 

Clint suddenly understood the implications of Nat’s sacrifice. 

But none of them remembered Michael, or the doctor, or heaven, or meeting God. 

“It’s a miracle,” Steve said. 


End file.
